Rusticus : Or, the future of the countryside

After two decades spent in distant parts of the empire, a reflective Englishman returns home, hoping to find the familiar green fields, grey churches and quiet hedgerows of his youth. He sets off from Folkestone in a motor‑car, a novelty that still feels daring, and watches the landscape unfold through the windscreen. The journey quickly becomes a meditation on how the countryside he once knew is being reshaped.

Along the main road the old lanes have been widened, ancient oaks replaced by wire fences, and a forest of petrol stations and wireless poles sprout where hedges once grew. New bungalow clusters line the route, their cheap materials and uniform forms clashing with the rustic character of the villages they invade. As the traveler compares his memories with the present, he confronts the uneasy balance between progress and the loss of England’s pastoral charm.